


Of Words Unsaid and Second Chances

by bfketh



Series: Of Dark Memories and Bright Tomorrows [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Fluff and Angst, Frottage, Happy Ending, M/M, Smut, Suicide, The Bad Stuff Pretty Much Applies to the Past Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-05
Updated: 2014-06-05
Packaged: 2018-02-03 12:56:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1745420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bfketh/pseuds/bfketh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"My name is Jean Kirschstein, and, for as long as I can remember, I've had dreams of another time, another place, another world."</p><p>Reborn into a world that never heard of Titans and where the Walls never existed, Jean eventually discovers that he isn't the only one. Slowly, he reconnects to everyone that was important to him in that other life.</p><p>Or so he thinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Words Unsaid and Second Chances

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't hurt me.

My name is Jean Kirschstein, and, for as long as I can remember, I've had dreams of another time, another place, another _world_.

It started out as nightmares at first, confusing, jumbled images of lumbering, misshapen giants, people in green cloaks flying through the air around them, suspended on thin wires. _Me_ flying through the air around them, sunlight glinting off razor-sharp blades. And blood. The blood was everywhere. Blood, death, and fear.

As I grew older, the dreams grew more ordered and more detailed. I dreamed of other things. A mess hall filled with people, with _kids_. I dreamed of us training together, talking, fighting (that was one kid in particular), joking around, the boys all sleeping in one barracks together. In some of the dreams we were older, the mess hall was different, the symbol of crossed swords we all wore replaced by wings. And…there were fewer of us. The older we were in the dreams, the fewer of us there were. There were still a lot of people there, different people from before, but even in my sleeping mind I dismissed them. _Outsiders. Unimportant._ They weren't _us_. They hadn't trained and fought and bled and died alongside us. Their faces were too new, too young, too innocent.

I never told my parents about the dreams. When I was little, it was just because I  _couldn't_. I couldn't do anything other than cry and shake in Mom’s arms after I woke up screaming. When I was older, I didn't tell them because I didn't want them to think I was crazy. Yeah, Mom, Dad, every night when I go to sleep, I dream about memories from a past life where giants ate people. Really fucking sane, right?

Even without telling them, though, it seemed as if Mom just knew. Whenever I’d had a particularly bad dream, a nightmare where I watched another one of my friends die, she’d always make my favorite breakfast for me. Without a word, she’d set an omelet down in front of me, and I’d slowly start to relax as whatever dread or sorrow had settled on me from the night before drained away, replaced by comfort and a warm feeling of nostalgia. I wondered, sometimes, if Mom had dreams, too.

I also wondered if maybe I really was crazy.

It wasn't until my sophomore year of high school that I had my first undeniable proof that, no, I wasn't crazy. Those dreams really _were_ memories.

 

The summer after I’d turned fifteen, the old man got a promotion. It was a huge thing, and it meant we’d have to move halfway across the country, from Gary, Indiana to Seattle, Washington. It didn't really bother me; I’d never connected with anyone at my old school, and I was shit at making friends, so it wasn't like I was leaving anyone behind. It was my first day at my new school, and I’d decided to go outside to eat lunch when it happened.

As I stood there, blinking in the sunlight and trying to find a quiet place to sit and eat my sandwiches in peace, I heard a loud, obnoxious voice yell out from across the quad, “Commander Horseface!”

I _knew_ that voice. I knew it as well as I knew my own.

The next moment, a heavy weight slammed into my side, and I ended up flat on my back on the grass, staring up at a boy with a goofy grin, messy brown hair, and the brightest damn green eyes I have ever seen.

And they _were_ bright, and _alive_ , not dull and staring into nothing as they had been the last time I looked into them.

"Eren, you fucking..." I reached around him, grabbing the fabric of the back of his t-shirt tightly in my fists. "...asshole." The last word was muffled by his shoulder as I pulled him to me.

He laughed, "It's good to see you again, too."

...Just so you know, I definitely did not cry into his shirt. Because that shit would be embarrassing.

And I certainly didn't cry even harder when he dragged me over to where Mikasa and Armin were waiting for him. Of course, those three were together. I get the feeling that, no matter how many lifetimes we live, those three will always begin theirs together.

I did find it somewhat poetic that the three I found first were the three that had been with me until the end.

We slowly found the others after that. Connie and Sasha. Ymir and Christa. Armin managed to track down Annie, and eventually, he persuaded her to bring Reiner and Bertholt to meet with us. They'd been reluctant at first. Considering everything that had happened, I couldn't really blame them. But what was the point of second chances if we couldn't forgive people who hadn't had any more choice in their fate than the rest of us?

Eren had been the one to find Captain Levi, and I can't say I was surprised. For his part, Levi had already made contact with the rest of his old squad, and Hanji had found _him_ a long time ago. By the time we graduated college, the only one missing was the Commander.

 

I saw him that winter. In the mall of all places.

He was with a woman, a little girl, four, maybe five years old, between them, holding tight to both their hands. He looked...happy. Peaceful, like I had never seen him before. I smiled without even meaning to, when suddenly he looked up, and my eyes met ones of piercing blue.

He turned to the woman next to him, "Marie, can you take Sarah over to the line? I'll join you in a minute."

She glanced over at me before looking up at him and nodding. She gently tugged on the small hand in hers, "Come on, sweetie, let's go see Santa while Daddy talks to his friend."

He watched them go, still smiling, before turning to me with a more serious look on his face, "Kirschstein."

"Sir," I unconsciously straightened up, my right hand curling into a fist. I barely stopped myself from going into the full salute.

The corner of his lips twitched, "It's just 'Erwin' now, Jean."

"Yeah..." I relaxed a little, brushing my hand over the short hair on the back of my head, "It's a little hard to get used to, you know? I don't think I ever stopped thinking of you as 'Commander.' For that first year, whenever someone called me that, I kept looking over my shoulder, expecting to see you standing there. It was...it was so hard, with you gone."

"I'm sorry." Two words. Two small words, but they were loaded with so much weight.

I nodded, "I know." We stood there in silence for a while, pressed into a corner of the wall as the crowds of holiday shoppers flowed past us. I cleared my throat and looked at the floor, "We won in the end, though. The Titans were wiped out, and Historia was crowned Queen. We...lost a lot of people, a lot of _good_ people, to get there though. I always wondered, in the back of my mind, if you wouldn't have done a better job of it than I did."

Erwin clapped his hand on my shoulder, "You did what I failed at, Jean. Be proud." He pulled his hand away when I finally looked back up and met his gaze, " _All_ the Titans were killed?"

I didn't have to ask what he meant. "Yes. All of them."

He didn't have to ask what I meant, either. He changed the subject, "I've run into a few people so far: Mike, Nanaba, Shadis... What about you? Have you found anyone else?"

"Yeah. Everyone."

 

It was a little after New Years when we all got together, as one group, for the first time. I was sitting on one of the couches in Erwin's basement rec room, sipping on a beer, when Armin and Eren sat down next to me. I grinned, "It's nice, isn't it? Having us all back together, I mean."

Eren just smiled before looking over the room, "Yeah, it is."

Armin, however, frowned slightly, "Not everyone's here, though."

I shrugged. We hadn't been able to find everyone we knew in the 104th, and some of the ones we did find - Mina, Thomas, Daz, Franz, Hannah - wanted to focus on the life they had now instead of clinging to the past, although they were happy enough to see us. But all the important ones were here.

Or so I thought.

Armin was still looking at me, that familiar calculating gleam I remembered so well from the past coming into his eyes, "I'm surprised you're not looking harder for him."

"Huh?" I scoured through my memories, trying to figure out who Armin meant. Behind him, I noticed Eren whipping his head around, narrowing his eyes as he stared at me.

Armin raised his eyebrows. "Marco." His tone was matter-of-fact, as if it was the most obvious answer in the world.

I had no idea who he was talking about. My eyebrows scrunched together, "Who the hell is Mar-"

Suddenly, my words were cut off as I was hauled to my feet by the front of my shirt to stare into eyes that blazed with a green fire that I hadn't seen in a long, long time.

"You forgot?! Fucking hell, Kirschstein, he was your best friend!" Eren roared as he shook me by the lapels. As I grabbed ineffectually at his wrists, I was dimly aware of all the conversation around us stopping while Eren continued his tirade, "He was the whole reason you joined the Scouting Legion! When he died at Trost-"

I didn't hear anything else Eren said. It was if I had been suddenly plunged into a deep, black pit, the blood in my veins replaced with ice. It wasn't memories that came to me then, but waves of emotion: fear, shock, grief. And interlacing it all, surrounding every feeling and thought until it overpowered it, was a regret so sharp and strong it was a physical sensation. I could smell it, like smoke in the air. Taste it, like ash on my tongue. Feel it, like fire on my skin.

The next thing I knew, Levi was yanking Eren away with a muttered, "You need to calm down, brat." I felt someone touch my shoulder, and looked to my left to see Mikasa, concern clear in her eyes.

"Are you alright?"

I gave myself a mental shake and smiled at her, "Yeah, I'm fine."

Her eyebrows drew together, "You're crying."

"What? I'm not-" I froze as her hand came up and gently touched my face. I found myself mimicking her gesture, raising my own hand to my other cheek.

My fingertips came away wet.

 

The next two weeks were a living hell. I could barely eat; I couldn't sleep. According to the others, when we were trainees, Marco and I were inseparable. He really was my best friend as Eren had said. And I knew he must have had an impact on me. I remembered my original goal had been to join the Military Police, but, after the Battle of Trost, I decided to join the Scouting Legion instead. I'd never really questioned _why_ I'd made that decision before now. Yet every time I tried to remember, I couldn't

Not his face, not his voice, not his words. I could get brief glimpses of emotion; a feeling of trust, gratitude, affection, happiness. Sometimes, briefly, the sensation of warm hands. But always, always, _always_ whatever I could grasp was almost immediately swept away by sadness and that overwhelming regret.

The worst part was that I couldn't even remember _what_ it was that I was regretting.

Armin theorized that it was a defense mechanism; that my own brain was shutting down on me to protect me from trauma. Well, fuck my stupid brain, then, because there were a hell of a lot of other traumatizing memories that it had no trouble recalling.

I remembered Connie, swooping in when my maneuver gear malfunctioned, buying me the time to get it working again and get away from the Titan charging me, at the cost of his own life. Sasha, beautiful Sasha, who was so brave despite her fear, fell covering our escape on that very same disaster of a mission. Ymir, sacrificing herself to protect Christa, who was so important to all of us, but especially to her. Reiner and Bertholt, fighting for a home that they would never see again. Annie, discovered and executed by the Military Police. We lost sight of Hanji during the last push against the Titans, only to find her body later, piled up with the rest of the nameless dead for burning. Levi had survived that last battle, but his wounds were severe, and the resulting fever killed him less than a week later. He lived long enough to see Christa crowned as Queen Historia, and then he was gone.

After that the Scouting Legion received a new mission: to explore and map the world outside the walls, and make sure there were no pockets of Titans left. So, that's what we did, Mikasa, Armin, Eren, and I. We made it together as far as the ocean that Armin had always talked about. I remembered Eren saying he wanted a few minutes alone to say goodbye to Levi.

I remembered him walking along the shore and disappearing from sight behind an outcrop of rock.

I remembered the single, loud rapport of a gun.

I remembered running, Armin and Mikasa right beside me.

I remembered looking into green eyes that stared sightlessly out over the pounding waves as blood pooled on the sand.

He'd angled the small handgun he'd hidden away behind his head, aiming the bullet up into his brain through the nape of his neck, the only vulnerable spot on a Titan.

Eren had fulfilled the vow he'd made so long ago.

I remembered all that, yet I couldn't remember the _one_ person who had apparently meant more to me than anyone else. The one who was responsible for the entire course of my past life.

 

I was a mess.

I must have looked it, too, because after two weeks of obsessing over my lack of memory, I came into work bright and early one Friday morning, only to have Petra take one look at me and immediately order me home, telling me to get some sleep and that I'd better come in looking rested on Monday.

So, naturally, after leaving the office, I was standing in line at a Starbucks for a coffee.

It wasn't my usual Starbucks. I could just imagine Petra catching me there while on a coffee run for Levi and dragging me home by the ear. This one was closer to the financial district and had a lot more people in suits than the one by the little IT company that Levi ran. One of the guys in suits was right in front of me in the line. He had dark, short hair and stood a little taller than me. While the line slowly moved, I found myself absentmindedly counting the freckles on the back of his neck.

Finally, it was his turn. "Tall cinnamon dolce latte, please."

The world stopped.

"Mar...co..."

He turned, slowly, eyes widening in surprise. They were brown; I knew they would be brown. I _remembered_ that they were brown.

I remembered everything.

I remembered his smile, his laugh, his encouragement. I remembered tentative, exploratory touches in the dark, a quick stolen kiss in the corner, all the words we'd ever said to each other.

And everything I'd left unsaid.

Everything I'd kept inside, until it was too late.

The world sprang up into life around me, and I started to shake. I stumbled, and familiar, warm hands shot out, steadying me. Marco called back over his shoulder to cancel his order, and steered my unresisting body out the door. I was vaguely aware of him pulling out a cellphone as he bundled me into a nearby car. "Yeah, Hitch? I'm going to be taking a personal day today. Hm? No, I'm fine; something just came up. Thanks. See you on Monday."

He got into the driver's seat and fastened his seat belt before pulling away from the curb. He glanced over at me as he drove, "Are you okay, Jean?"

I took a deep breath, trying to settle down after the shock of having all my memories come flooding back at once, "Yeah... Yeah, I'm good. It's just, you know..."

He nodded, eyes back on the road, "Yeah. I do."

The rest of the car ride was silent, but it was the comfortable silence that we used to share so often, back in our training days. By the time Marco pulled into a parking garage and led me into the elevator and up to his apartment, I'd finally calmed down and gotten myself back under control. He took off his shoes and coat in the entryway, and I copied him before stepping into the apartment proper and looking around.

It was large, airy and brightly lit, with white walls and hardwood floors. Marco's furniture was sleek and modern, and huge windows looked out from the high-rise and over the city. The place was spotlessly clean and free of clutter. Levi would approve.

I stepped up to the window to get a better look at the view, making a low whistle. I turned back to Marco, "Nice place you got here. Looks like you're doing pretty well for yourself."

Marco leaned somewhat awkwardly against the arm of his couch, "I do all right. That's not really what you want to talk about, though, is it?"

I coughed into my hand, suddenly feeling just as awkward, "No, I guess not."

"So, have you...met any of the others?"

"Yeah," I smiled, "Yeah, I did. Eren, Armin, Mikasa, Connie...I just ran into Erwin last month."

"Erwin?" Marco's brows knotted together "Erwin Smith? You joined the Scouting Legion?"

"Oh, yeah..." I trailed off, realizing that of course, Marco wouldn't know about my change of heart. "I decided, after Trost and you...you..." My words froze in my throat as that crushing sensation of grief and regret crashed down on me yet again. I wasn't standing in Marco's apartment anymore; I was on that dusty, rubble-strewn street, the scent of dirt and blood and death thick in my nostrils. My vision started to blur, but when I closed my eyes, all I could see was the red flames of a funeral pyre rising into the night, turning the most important person in my world into an unrecognizable pile of ash and bits of broken, charred bone, taking him away before I'd even had a chance to tell him how much he'd meant to me. When I'd only started to realize for myself just how much he'd meant to me.

"Jean!" I felt a pair of warm, strong arms wrap around me, pulling me close. A hand came up to stroke my hair as I buried my face into Marco's shoulder, inhaling his familiar scent. "I'm right here, Jean. I'm not going anywhere. I'm alive. See?" He took my hand and splayed it over his chest, just above his heart. As I felt it beat, strong and steady, I had a moment of clarity. I realized, I hadn't been afraid of remembering his death. I'd been afraid of finding him again, only to lose him again with those words still unsaid.

No. Not this fucking time.

"Marco." I pulled back so I could look up into his face. It suddenly struck me that his face was both familiar and unfamiliar to me. He was an adult now, instead of the boy I knew, his jaw firmer, his cheeks thinner, his chin more defined. His eyes were the same, though, warm and brown and deep, and I caught them in my own gaze as I said the words I'd been holding onto for an entire lifetime, "I love you."

I heard the soft catch of breath in his throat and felt his heartbeat quicken under my hand as his eyes widened slightly. Then, something in his eyes softened, and he bent his head down and smiled as he brushed the tip of his nose against mine, "I love you, too. I always have."

The kiss was gentle at first, languid and sweet, as we slowly relearned the feel of each other all over again.

It wasn't enough.

I'm not sure who initiated it, but soon the kisses were all biting teeth and exploring tongues, our fingers tangled in each other's hair. Marco broke away from the kiss, only to trail his lips down my jaw and throat, nibbling and sucking along the way.

I shivered as my suddenly clumsy fingers struggled to undo Marco's tie. At some point, either I'd pushed his suit jacket off of him or he'd taken it off, leaving it crumpled carelessly on the floor. I gasped as Marco's lips found my clavicle and he sank his teeth into my skin. Then, he licked the offended area, and electricity ran down my spine.

My pants were quickly growing uncomfortably tight. I groaned and dug my fingers into his hips, rolling my own forward, trying to get as much friction as I could. I smirked to myself when Marco let out a choked gasp as our clothed erections brushed together. Wanting to hear more of that beautiful sound, I undulated into him again.

"Hah! J-Jean...bed...bedroom..." Marco forced out between more gasps and soft moans, and I nodded and let him pull me toward the hallway. We both shed pieces of clothing along the way until, finally, I was kneeling over him on his rumpled bedspread. I ran my hands down his chest, taking in the sight of his tanned skin covered with freckles, his cock, flushed and perfect against his belly, his dark eyes staring up into mine with the pupils blown wide.

Fuck, he was gorgeous.

...Fuck, I didn't have any condoms.

"Hey, Marco..." I leaned down, peppering kisses along his jaw and throat.

"Hm?"

"Where do you, uh, where do you keep your stuff?"

"...Stuff?" There was genuine confusion in his voice, and I pulled back from him and sighed.

"You know, condoms? Lube?" I tried to ignore the heat I felt rising to my cheeks.

"Oh...Oh! Um..." He pulled his lower lip into his teeth, biting it nervously, "I, uh, I don't have any."

"What?" I propped myself up and raised my eyebrows in disbelief.

"Well, I never really needed...that stuff before. I haven't, um..." He trailed off, his ears turning red. I was torn between the urge to swear in frustration and the urge to kiss the embarrassment away.

I opted for the kissing. "It's fine," I murmured against his lips before lifting my head to grin at him, "Gives us something to look forward to. After all, we've got time now, right?"

Marco smiled back at me and wrapped his arms around me, and my breath caught in my throat as I was reminded all over again of how beautiful his smile was. "Yeah..." he sighed as he nuzzled into my neck, "We've got time."

I leaned my head back as his breath tickled against my skin and rolled my hips forward to grind into Marco. It felt so much fucking better than it had through our pants. I did it again, and Marco _moaned_ into my ear, arching his hips up to meet me and scratching his nails along my back. His reaction encouraging me, I reached a hand between us, wrapping it around both our cocks and pressing them together.

I slid my hand up, swirling my thumb across both our slits to smear around the precum gathering there. At that, Marco bucked up into my hand, a loud "Fuck!" spilling from his lips. I grinned at the rare slip and started to work my hand more, twisting my wrist and paying special attention to the head of Marco's dick.

When he brought a hand to his mouth and bit into his knuckles to cover up the sounds leaking out, I shook my head and pulled it away with my free hand, lacing our fingers together, "No, don't... let me hear you...I wanna hear you... _Marco_..." My own breath was coming in shaky gasps and pants now. I was close, my arousal becoming a tightened coil in the pit of my stomach.

Marco must have been close, too. His head fell back against the pillows with a groan as his hips started to thrust up hard, fucking himself into the space where my hand joined us together. And then the hand I was holding tightened around my fingers, his other hand fisting in my hair and pulling. He came screaming my name, and I followed right behind, our release a sticky mess between us.

I ignored it, collapsing on top of him until my breathing evened out and the world stopped spinning around me. Then all I did was roll off of him and onto the bed. I pillowed my head against his shoulder and draped my arm across his chest as the exhaustion from my recent lack of sleep finally caught up with me. As my mind started to drift away into blissful, dreamless unconsciousness, I mumbled, "I fucking love you."

I could feel Marco's chest rumble, but I was so far gone I have no idea if it was a reply or if he was just laughing at me.

 

I woke up some indeterminable amount of time later, my mind still groggy with sleep. The first thing I noticed was that I was warm; after I had fallen asleep, Marco must have cleaned me off and pulled a blanket over me. The second thing I noticed was that Marco was sitting up in the bed beside me with a book. I blinked sleepily up at him as I realized he wore reading glasses. Hot.

The third thing I noticed was that my phone was ringing from somewhere near the vicinity of the floor. That had been what had woken me up. I groaned and shut my eyes again. I didn't want to move. Marco's bed was comfortable, and it smelled like him, and he was right here next to me, and I was still so very tired. Then I felt a foot nudge my leg. "Aren't you going to answer that?"

I huffed and rolled over, flipping him off as I did. I groped around the floor where my pants had been flung (and I was pretty sure Marco had been the one doing the flinging of that particular piece of clothing, the bastard) and just managed to hook my fingers on the leg and pull them toward me. I fumbled my phone out of the pocket and looked at the display. Eren. Great.

I propped myself up with one arm and unlocked my phone. Behind me, I could hear Marco set his book and glasses down. He pressed up against my back, casually running a hand along my hip.

"Hello?"

"Jean, where the fuck are you?"

"Petra sent me home for the day."

I heard a heavy sigh on the other end of the line. "I know that, Secretariat. She asked me to make sure you were sleeping."

"Well, I _was_ sleeping until you decided to call me and wake me up."

"Where? I'm looking at your bed right now and you're not in it."

I pulled my phone away from my ear to stare at it in disbelief. Meanwhile, Marco had started to draw lazy patterns on the blanket over my hipbone with his finger. I put the phone back to my ear, "How the hell did you get into my apartment?"

"You gave Armin a key." He sounded smug.

"Okay number one, I gave that key to _Armin_ in case of an emergency, and number two, checking up on me to make sure I'm following Petra's orders isn't an emergency."

"You don't know Petra as well as I do. Where are you?"

"I told you: I was sleeping." Marco started trailing feather-light kisses along the back of my neck. It was distracting, to say the least.

"Not in your bed, you're not."

"Obviously." There was a beat of silence as Eren let the implications of what I'd said sink in. Then-

"Oh, holy shit! Who is it?"

"What?"

"Who are you with? Do I know them?"

"None of your damn busi- Marco!" I suddenly yelped as Marco's wandering hand dipped lower. I scowled at him over my shoulder, but he just smiled innocently back at me.

"Marco? Wait, you found Marco?! Hey, let me talk to him! Marco! Marcooo!!" Eren started hollering into the phone, and I winced and pulled my phone away.

"Hi, Eren."

"Don't encourage him." I spoke into the phone again, "Jesus, calm down."

"Jean, you have to bring him down to meet everyone!"

"Like fuck you spazzes are meeting hi-ow!" Marco had pinched my side. "I mean, not today. I'll...bring him down to the usual bar tomorrow night, okay? We can all get together then."

"Yeah, okay. But you better show up, or I'm breaking out our high school yearbooks."

"You wouldn't dare."

"Just watch me, Bucephalus." He abruptly hung up, not giving me a chance to respond.

I tossed the phone onto the nightstand and fell back onto the bed with a groan. Marco let out a soft laugh and snuggled up next to me. We stayed like that for a while, my hand idly playing with the back of Marco's hair while my other hand covered his where it lay on top of my chest.

"Hey, Jean," Marco's voice tentatively broke the silence. "Can I ask you something?"

"Hm?"

"Have you...been with anyone?" His eyes briefly flicked up to mine before dropping down to our joined hands.

I hesitated for a moment, chewing my lip while I debated what to say. Finally, I decided to go with the truth, "Yeah. In my other life. Not this one." I paused. They'd been meaningless, one-night stands for the most part; some of them I hadn't even known their names, or cared to. It was almost surprisingly easy to find women, and no few men, willing to spend a night warming the empty bed of the Commander that had ended the Titan threat. "I...was lonely." The words sounded hollow to my own ears; a flimsy excuse.

Marco lifted himself up, staring down at me with eyes gone dark and unreadable. I wondered in that moment if he hated me. If he was disgusted at me for being weak. But all he said was, "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." I reached up to cup his face in my hands. I pulled him down to me, until our foreheads rested together, and I closed my eyes, "I'm not proud of it, but none of them..." I opened my eyes, staring into his own just centimeters away, "They weren't _you_."

He brought a hand up, lacing his fingers through mine, "I meant it; I'm not going anywhere this time, Jean. We've got an entire lifetime ahead of us, and I won't ever let you be lonely like that again. I promise."

He kissed me then, gentle and slow and deep, and I took his words and his kiss, and sealed his vow deep in my heart. And I made a promise of my own. That I would treasure every day together that we'd been given.

That I would never leave him alone again.

That I would never forget him again.

That I would always find him.

That I would always love him.

For the rest of this lifetime.

And for all the lives that we might live.


End file.
